Had one, thanks!

Silly example, but brought a smile to my lips, so thanks!

Your concept of America is a dangerous one, which perhaps explains why you are so against secularists coming to power.  Ergo, they practice the same style of coersive government that you believe it, but toward different goals. [nana]

This concept leaves little room for individual liberty, and is a 3rd way socalist type of communal thought.  All lovers of liberty, must accept that actions they are pesronally appalled by will take place, and while they may criticize, they must resist the urge to legally eliminate.  

Where a governing body can draw a line, is where the actions of one, directly harm another another against their will.  Where there is no harm, there is no crime, and 'society' can never be considered the victim.  Clearly abortion fits into the 'harm', and that is what this thread is about.  Harm is being done, but does it effect another?  It's a damn good question, one I don't have the answer to.

Personally, I don't like abortion at all, and feel that the mother or baby better have big problems if the mother is considering a late term one.  I don't want to make early term ones illegal though.  I wonder if it's not better to allow it, rather than force a woman to be a mother when she so didn't want to be, that she was willing to kill the growing fetus.

What you are asking us is a rather ridiculous question.
It is akin to the question 'Suppose guns are banned.  Are you willing to be vaporized by an F15 dropping a nuclear weapon on your head?'  So, how serious a gun owner are you?  I've got the Air Force on the line right now, and they are waiting for a vector.
Remember, the debate is about choice.  Why do you focus on the destructive choice, and advocate it, instead of focusing on the choice when it is easy and painless?

Easy, when it can survive independent of the mother. Before three months, a fetus IS NOT a human.

The Air Force just gave me an update.  They had to pull the F15 away.  You'll have to settle for an aging F4 Phantom from the Maine Air National Guard.

[yoda]"..and that is why you fail."[/yoda]

Seek first to understand, then to be understood.




So if I'm married and my wife becomes pregnant and wants to abort, but I want to have the child, I should pay for that right with one of my testies? !?!?!? WTF?

I wish you would tell us what religion it is that you follow. You mention it from time to time, 'every day is Thanksgiving' and such, but I don't think I'm ever going to understand where you are coming from without some insight into the foundation.

I was raised Catholic and now attend a non-denominational Bible church. I guess I could be considered "born again" as I, in the spirit of Christianity, accept Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and savior and have been baptized.

I do believe that upbringing has laid the foundation for my belief in defending the defenseless life of a baby in the womb. Not because the Catholic church says so, but because my belief in God has shown me that there is allot that I don't know about heaven just as there is allot I don't know about the developing baby. I know what I don't know.

Therefore, I choose to err on the side of caution. Its a friggin baby. Be honest. To classify it as, 'what a woman does with her body' relegates it to her property. (See Dred Scott's case)

The heart of the failure to resolve this argument revolves around the lack of HONESTY. To support our own selfish desires we deny what we know to be the truth.

We want sex with no strings attached and are willing to turn a blind eye to the truth that it is a baby. We pass off  our responsibly (our responsibly as men, women have their own unique ones) to women because we know we can manipulate them into having abortions and absolving us of the burden of raising the child.

I could go on an on... but if you aren’t going to try to understand, you aren’t going to understand. If we are not going to be honest with ourselves, we will continue to live this lie.

Let me leave with this.

You are brought to a field with a car in it and instructed to blow it up by pushing a button. The car is covered with a tarp so you can't see inside. Carelessly you walk over to the button, but just before you push it, they say, "There may be a person in that car." Would you push the button?

- LS

Actually, I was agreeing with the IBTL and I suppose I should have stated that. Just a simple answer is easy, though. Piss off! [;D]




[devil]

So it's not a human because it cannot live independantly from the mother? Why is that a criteria for being human?

If pro-deathers were intellectually honest with themselves they would realize that simply by naming certain stages of a babies development (e.g. fetus) doesn't make it any less a human baby. And the only reason they are jumping through hoops to classify the baby non-human is so they can eliminate the consequences of there irresponsibility (see disclaimer below).

And for the "we can't tell a woman what to do with her body crowd" Pro-lifers believe that the baby inside a woman is a human baby that has a right to life. We believe that babies life is more important than the mothers right to not be inconvenianced for a few months. Which by the way is a consequence of her own actions.

DISCLAIMER: the above rant does not apply to abortions due to rape, incest or when the mothers life is in danger.


Thanks for starting the thread danonly, I can't think of a better subject for my first team member post.
 

Now you are being inconsistent.  Behold: [b]We believe that babies life is more important than the mothers right to not be inconvenianced for a few months.[/b]  But in the case of pregnancy due to rape, you believe that the innocent baby is sacrifical, simply due to the fact that the pregnancy was involunatry to start with.  Thus, I can only conclude that your problem with abortion is a responsibility issue, and not a moral or legal position.

My bible say's "before you were in your mothers womb, I knew you"



See above.

Then why is Peterson being tried for a double murder?

Nice try, No inconsistancy though because I don't believe in abortions due to rape. I put that in the disclaimer because I made several references in my post to the fact that a woman is only getting an abortion so that she doesn't have to deal with the consequences of her own irresponsibility. Obviously if she was raped she is not pregnant due to irresponsibility.

But if I truly believe that a baby is a baby. Then I cannot believe it's OK to kill him because his/her father victimized someone.

My problem with abortion is that I can only lie to myself for so long. I used to be for it (at least indifferent). But I couldn't keep telling myself that a baby wasn't a baby just to justify killing it to keep from inconveniancing those responsible for it's creation.

For those of you who don't believe abortions are mostly for conveniance here are some statistics.


The overwhelming majority of all abortions, (95%), are done as a means of birth control.

Only 1% are performed because of rape or incest;

1% because of fetal abnormalities;

3% due to the mother's health problems.


Info found here:
[url]http://www.abortiontv.com/AbortionStatistics.htm#Why%20Abortions%20Are%20Performed[/url]

After re-reading this entire thread (The market is going a bit crazy in my sector guys, thanks for allowing me the couple of hours away ), I am struck by the obvious desire for the vast majority of you to stop abortions.

SO I will reiterate my offer, if any one of you on this message so far beleives in stopping abortion that much, I will pay for a fetus not to be aborted and to be raised to the age of 10 years.

All I ask of you, is for you to surgically  have your testicles removed.  I see it as a small price for you to pay for the mothers inconvience for 9 months.  I am sure that you will agree with me.

Serious offer, all's I would need was your home address to send a contract to, I will even arrange for the surgery for you.

Back up your words with some action.

Or, is it easier to strip women of their inherent rights to self governance over their own bodies than to save that poor childs life?

Who has enough faith in their convictions?  Step up.

Evade and Distract.  Evade and Distract.  Keep going [;)]

How so DF?  

We are not going to solve anything, we are not going to change each others minds, I am making a viable offer.

Nothing evasive about it.  

But, you could of course stun me with  taking me up on it.  To meet a man of convictions is rare in this world.

But, I fully expect none of you who are so willing to dictate allowable medical procedures for women to allow that to apply to yourselves also.

Uh, because it isn't developed enough to be called a human, it barely has any human features. It would die by itself. There are scientific names for the stages because that's what it is, science. Pro-lifers remind me of anti-gunners. Can't reason with them. It's none of your business what someone does with their body as long as it's not harming you. Someone getting an abortion does not harm you in any way. If you think they'll go to hell for having an abortion, fine, think that. But stay out of other people's business. It's as simple as that.

The idea you present, is for me to destroy/damage myself in order to prevent an abortion.  Your dillema is structured so nobody will take you up on it.
Come back to reality, please.

I am not asking you to damage yourself DF, I am asking you to submit your body to the dictate of someone else.

My offer is structured in such a way as to bring about the outcome I desire.

I have two desires in this matter, either is fine by me.

The first is, to show the anti-freedom folks to be the hypocrites that they unfortunately are.

The second is, I get to remove one more breeder from the gene pool if they take me up on it.

In my mind, a win-win if there ever was.

I understand that women, with their ability to bear children have a serious responsibility, I further understand that I do not want a woman to bring a child into this world who is not 100% on board with that decision, and all it entails (God just won't provide in my world, you and will).  I also understand that some men feel justified in chaining a woman to her ovaries, for whatever reason these men feel that way, be it religous convictions, or just hatred of women, or a fear of a woman being equal to themselves.

Why shouldn't your choices entail consequences also?  

Why shouldn't your body be controlled by someone else?

Come on DF, take me up on it.

Appropriately vague. Obviously from someone familiar with contract language.



So I have to permanently sacrifice my ability to have children with my wife so that someone who carelessly gets pregnant can get free subsidy for a temporary (10 yrs. but probably less once child protective services takes the child from the parent because of neglect) responsibility?

Put forth a balanced offer and I'll demonstrate my conviction.

- LS

The offer is perfectly balanced, for me.  It is not to your liking, as I suspect it is not to many peoples liking.

It is rather *personal*, isn't it?

But lets make sure that 16 year old who gets herself knocked up can have no  real chance at a life byu ensuring that she can't get an abortion, it serves her right!


Doesn't it?

[b]Exactly.[/b]

And it continues.



Dude. You are really scaring me as I do in fact have considerable respect for you and hold you in high regard in most things (other than abortion) but this stuff is really incoherent.

No real chance?!? You don't know that.

Ensuring that she can't get an abortion?!? I never purposed that. Nor have I taken such as crass a position as to say "it serves her right."

You are injecting your fears (overpopulation) and issues (hatred of women) into us who hold both women AND babies in high regard.

Your offer is vague and lopsided. I will not sacrifice my potential descendants so cheaply.

Offer to donate ALL your combined wealth to the establishment of a organization that will protect the unborn and maybe I'll take you seriously.

- LS

To answer the original question -

I am not completely convinced that a baby is even "human" AFTER it's born.  To be "human" to me is a matter of complex cognition and self-awareness, which is what separates us from the animals. A newborn child is not "human" to my understanding, neither is an adult in a persistent vegetative state (like that women in the news from Florida).  

I'm guessing that you START to become a human about age 3 or 4 - and you're not fully human until your brain is fully developed.



To me, the issue about abortion is not technically about what's human or not.  It's about protecting those who cannot protect themselves - just like there are laws to protect animals.  Personally, I couldn't care less if some aggregation of cells has minauture hands, or has a heartbeat, or can fart or breakdance in the womb.  

Ultimately, it's up to individuals to decide whether or not they are willing to live with their choices - and the consequences thereof, both in this life and beyond.

My friend, I already keep the doors open on a Crisis Pregnancy Center in my area.  (It balances my donations to Planned Parenthood .)

While I respect you on many matters also, the abortion thing is one of those things I just don;t understand, especially when men try to interject themselves into it.

I can see a woman deciding not to have an abortion, I can even see a woman crusading against other woemn having abortions, but I just can't see men getting involved.

YMMV (and obviously does).  Fun to chat about though.

And just think, I might get one of these guys to go for it.

My two year old will die if left by himself, so I guess it's OK for my wife to kill him if it's more conveniant for us.



Very observant. My point is that simply assigning a scientific name to a stage of the babies development doesn't make it less human.



No it doesn't harm me in any way but it sure is hell on the baby.




Of course I wouldn't expect a 16 year old to ruin her entire life because she made the mistake of getting pregnant. I would however ask her to inconveniance herself for nine months and then put the baby up for adoption. Seems a small price to pay to keep from killing an innocent child.

When it no longer is a sperm and egg.

Until a fetus takes its [u]second[/u] breath on its own, its just a parasitic growth on its host and is fully flushable.

BTW, there is no god [rolleyes]

Then why haven't we as a society pushed for the burial of all menstral material, there could be miscarried not-egg-not-sperm in there, couldn't there?

Don't those poor, not-egg-not-sperm deserve a proper burial?

Can't we do it for the not-egg-not-sperm?

(chuckles, shakes head) Why am I not surprised? Goodness. I think that's awesome.



Life. The creation of it, the responsibility that comes as a result of it, the defense and preservation of it, the value of it... etc. makes it as much or more a MAN's issue as a woman's.

How many WOMAN have abortions as a direct result of psychological manipulation from the father, married or not, to pressure the woman to abort. I bet the number would surprise you and me.

I have been involved with state Right to Life organizations. I realized many of the problems you allude to that make them of ineffectual. For a long time I thought, as you, that this is primarily a woman's issue and that women will determine its course. I now believe this is in err.

Men [b]are[/b] the leaders this type of social issue. If men were to lead in a clear responsible direction, women would follow. If men would show SOME control and keep their peckers in their pants, the number of abortions would nosedive.

THIS issue will eventually be resolved. The key is honesty.

Is slavery wrong? Not when you look at it from Stephen A. Douglas' perspective.

Lime will tell...  edit: <- ummm that is Time will tell.
- LS

I don't know, my son went through a phase where he was so attached to his momma that he would qualify as a parasitic growth. He was too big to flush though.

Hey, maybe that should be the criteria. Thier human as soon as there too big to flush! Seems just as logical as any other arbitrary criteria I've heard.

This is real simple, until a fetus votes for conservative candidates, it is not a human.  So, Al Gore and Howard Dean could still be aborted.

You are a smart guy, to the point of being denser than rock sometimes [:P]
The biological definition of life.  Lather, Rinse, Repeat.  Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

A child is not a tumor or boil.  It has a unique genetic identity given to it at conception.  That entitles the fetus/child to equal protection under the law as specified in the Constitution.

Before I answer your question, you have to answer mine:

At what point does night turn into day?

Well we can go back and forth on this all day long but what it boils down to is whether or not you believe it is a baby. I do and you obviuosly do not. Because there are some scientists that declare that a baby in the early stages of development is not a human does not make it so. There are many scientists who believe that it is a human baby the minute the egg is fertilized and the DNA pattern for a human is complete. Looking at it logically I would have to side with those since I've never heard of a woman giving birth to a non-human. (well... maybe Hillary's mom).

So looking at the Pro-Death arguments from the point of view that it is a baby you can see that they don't hold water.

"It's none of your business" - Yes it's our business to prevent the killing of innocent children.

"You can't tell a woman what to do with her body" - If her actions result in the death of an innocent child, you not only can, you must.

"You can't ruin a persons life because of one mistake"
and
"Who's gonna take care of the unwanted babies"

One word: ADOPTION

Um, not at all.

Abortion is perfectly legal in this great country.  And as such, a fetus is not granted any special (or even equal) protections under our laws.

But thanks for playing.

I really don't understand how one can be against one type of interference with "god's will" and not another.  You can't have it both ways.  If abortion is man's interfering with god's will to produce a child, then your friends interfered with god's will to take a child.  Anything else is xtian hypocrisy.

Wow!! the most convincing pro-death argument yet. Thats it, i'm officialy converted.

Now where can we find a Dr. to perform the "procedure"...

I don't get it?  Are you trying to equate slavery with abortion?

Fundamentally, I have no problems with slavery.  Fundamentally, i also have no problems with abortion.

Whats the problem?

I really wanted to sit this one out this time but I'll poke my nose in just to make this technical point -

People have been convicted of murder by causing the death of a fetus - that gives the fetus more legal status than say a hand or foot.

If a person assaults a pregnant woman and she loses an eye or some teeth - the attacker is not and cannot be charged with murder.

BUT - if the assault causes death of the woman's fetus - he can be charged with murder.


Bottomline - A "fetus" DOES have greater legal protections than simply a lifeless mass of tissue (which it's not) and in fact has nearly-equal legal protection as any "full" human does (which it should).

DAMN YOU! NOW I'm going to have to buy MORE stuff from you!

- LS

No problem with slavery?  That kind of tongue slip loses debates. [:)]

Talk to God about that.  I just read what's in the book.

As no on eon here actually thinks they are going to sway anyon eelse with their arguments, I don't think we can call this a debate DF, more a conversation.

You take part in slavery every day, and seem to have no moral qualms about it.

I know I do, I am required to give up more than 70% of my earnings to other people, to do with as they see fit.  If that isn't slavery, I don't know what is.

Lol, I agree that adoption would be a better option.